The coming of the new year hasn’t slowed down the rapid pace of the ETF industry, with December showing high levels of activity on the product development front. December saw the debut of a number of first-to-market products as well several new and intriguing investment strategies. ETF issuers did not slow down the pace as a slew of new filings continued to pile in up until the end 2011 [for updates on all new ETFs, sign up for the free ETFdb newsletter]:

Global X, the relatively new ETF issuer that has already gathered more than $1 billion in assets, announced that it will close eight of its ETFs in the first quarter of 2012. Each of the ETFs to be closed has struggled to build assets during relatively short times on the market; they all launched at some point during 2011, and most will be less than a year old when they close their doors for good. The ETFs to be closed include: [click to continue…]

The developments of the last several years have highlighted the growing gap between the developed and emerging markets of the world. Advanced economies in North America, Europe, and Asia face mounting debt burdens and the prospect of a prolonged stretch of low economic growth. Meanwhile, many emerging markets have raced ahead, boasting blistering GDP growth […]

The ETP lineup now consists of nearly 1,200 individual products with aggregate assets of well more than $1 trillion. And both of those numbers continue to expand at an impressive rate; new ETFs are launched seemingly on a daily basis, while cash continues to flow out of traditional mutual funds and into exchange-traded products.

After a quiet stretch during the second half of December, January continued the wave of product innovation that has become common in the ETF industry. Various issuers introduced first-to-market products and continued the impressive expansion of the exchange-traded product pipeline. The month saw steady releases from various issuers to add to the 1,100+ exchange traded […]